Black, White, and Green with Envy
by Omnicat
Summary: Hei/Pai siblingry in South America. Affection is easy, acceptance is not.


**Title:** Black, White, and Green with Envy

**Author:** Omnicat v''v

**Rating:** K / G

**Genre:** General.

**Spoilers & Desirable Foreknowledge:** Everything.

**Warnings:** None.

**Pairings:** Hints of (one-sided?) Amber x Hei.

**Soundtrack:** None.

**Disclaimer:** If you recognize it, it's not mine. If you don't, it is.

**Summary:** One–Shot. Hei/Pai siblingry in South America. Affection is easy, acceptance is not.

**Author's Note:** Zi is a 'character' I made up myself, some kind of hotshot in the Cyndicate and Hei, Pai, Amber and Havoc's superior. His name means 'purple' in Chinese, just as Hei means 'black' and Pai means 'white'. So when he says Purple, he means this guy. And since I forgot to mention it at the first posting: when Hei and Pai say 'Red' and 'Grean' they're _also_ talking about people. People who are sitting around the fire with them, and who Hei doesn't want to know he's talking about them... ;)

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**Black, White, and Green with Envy**

"_Red reminds me of a starved cat."_

Pai could not help but be surprised. It spoke? During _mealtime?_ There was so much food in Hei's mouth, his puffed out cheeks looked ready to burst, but he managed to remain reasonably coherent and spray only a minimal amount of bread crumbs around as he spoke.

"_And Green is like a mermaid."_

Swallowing down a mouthfull of noodles, Pai raised her eyebrows. This was a rarity. It had been quite some time since he had last said something like that, especially of his own accord. The peace and quiet of the past few days must have started to bore him.

"_And Purple -"_ Hei tried to go on, but Pai interrupted him.

"_You've never met Zi."_

Hei shrugged. _"His voice, then. Just like a growling dog."_

He looked down into their small cooking fire then, and said nothing for a while as he finished the bread. Pai assumed those cryptic words were just another one of those random things he sometimes shared with her, without seeming to notice he was doing it half the time, and sought nothing behind them. Lingering youth sentiments. Nothing more.

Pai finished her noodles.

When Hei spoke again, it came as a surprise. His voice was lowered to a whisper, as if he didn't want to be heard even though they were already speaking in Mandarin and could not be understood by Havoc and Amber.

"_He bothers me. Not just his voice, but... as a person."_

As soon as the words had left him his eyes narrowed, his mouth snapped closed, his lips tightened, and a miniscule wrinkle appeared between his eyebrows.

_He didn't mean to say that,_ Pai thought, and felt herself frown too, before she could suppress the urge. Smoothing out her facial features, she managed not to shoot a glance across the fire, to Amber and Havoc. Strangely, the better she became at reading her brother's new expressions (_Did he leave the old ones behind when they left China?)_, the less she felt she could trust her teammates with them.

Which, she reminded herself, was an utterly irrational thought. It were words like those, not his expressions, that were dangerous. She supposed that somewhere deep down there was a rational explanation for her feelings, even if they were only rational when you were in a paranoid state of mind; paranoia was a healthy thing around here. But realising that did not take away from Pai's discomfort.

What _really_ bothered and disconcerted her were not the feelings themselves, but the intensity and persistent nature of the ones he provoked in her. Like the alarmed and surprised expressions that came over her face of their own violation, defying her self-control, the internal sensations proved hard to neutralize with the reason and logic she was used to. Even now, it was proving impossible to ignore the uncomfortable tug in her chest that seemed to be the result of Hei saying such dangerous things. It was maddening.

Not that a little craziness every once in a while was neccessarily a bad thing. After all, Hei seemed to thrive on it, and he was doing fine.

Pai frowned. Maybe 'fine' was too big a word.

"_So Green is like a mermaid, huh?"_ she said, surrepetitiously steering the conversation into safe, relatively carefree waters.

This time, she did look over at Amber - and found Amber staring right back at her. Amber smiled, as had become usual, and Pai smiled back, as was becoming just as usual. Havoc, being Havoc, tried to hide it, but Pai could tell she watched the siblings' exchange with at least as much interest as was to be expected from only interesting thing going on at the moment. Maybe more.

_Good thing they don't speak Chinese._

There was no danger in it, Pai finally concluded, glad to be rid of the indecision that had lingered even after she'd made the decision. Why _not_ play along? He was her brother, after all.

Pai blinked when she realised she automatically added the 'after all'. Naturally. Slowly, one of those automatic smiles which her conscious mind had no control over, spread on her face. _That's right. My brother. In more ways than one._

"_Why do you think so?"_ She looked at Hei, eyebrows raised in question, and offered him her empty bowl. He took it and eagerly refilled it with noodles from the large pot hanging over the fire. No surprise there. He'd never let the rule "what you use, you clean" stop him from eating.

"_Doesn't she to you?"_

"_Hm... I never thought about it."_ Pai cocked her head to the side. _"We should tell her, see what she thinks."_

Bits of noodle landed in Pai's lap.

"_N - no!"_ Hei spluttered, only to dissolve in a fit of coughing. Pai knocked him on the back with one hand and brushed the bits of noodle from her thighs with the other.

"_Why not? I'm sure she won't mind."_

Chest still heaving, Hei shot her a murky look. _"Just humour me, would you."_

"_Fine, fine. But I don't see the point in playing games with only two players when there are four people available."_ He was the expert at doing useless things, not she.

Hei shot her one last look, too intense and too short for Pai to decipher, before reverting back to his by-now-default monotone self and focussing on the remainders of his food.

"_Jokes at the expense of others should be kept private."_ he said in flat, clipped tones, and started shovelling in the noodles almost mechanically.

There was that tug in her chest again. Stupid and dangerous though it was to encourage him, Pai liked the quirky, silly, unpredictable big brother better than the reserved, calculating, ruthless Black Reaper.

_Now look who's acting the fool,_ Pai's rational side told her apprehensive side scathingly. _He's stuck by you all this time and has managed just fine. He knows what he's doing. You don't have to babysit him._

If anything, he was the one who was right in trying to babysit _her_.

"_Then I suppose I shouldn't be telling you that Green thought you looked like a sloth when you were hanging upside down in that tree the other day."_

Hei looked up sharply. The response typical for a Contractor would have been not to respond at all, which, when his eyes softened and he almost-smiled, made Pai all the more aware of how different her brother was from her, and from Havoc and Amber and all the others. Too bad they didn't speak Chinese.

"_No, technically speaking, you shouldn't have."_

Pai liked it.

She stretched lazily, bringing her arms upwards until her shoulders popped. _"Ah, well. We've already broken the rules now, might as well let Green in on the game, right?"_

"_Pai, no."_ he said with what she was sure was a whine.

"_Why not? She likes you. You make her act crazy. It would be fun."_

He looked away. _"I just don't want to... _play_ with her. Just with you."_

"_What's the difference?"_

The expression that greeted her was too much like a wirlwind for Pai to understand. But when he rose and spoke, he'd reverted back to monotony again. Perhaps the lack of emotion in his voice was the most painful part.

"_I wouldn't expect you to understand."_

He left, into the darkness of the jungle, abandoning his half-finished bowl of noodles.

Pai could have stopped him by saying _"I do."_, but did not. She wasn't sure she really did. Nor was she sure why the tugging in her chest had become so painful. But it felt soothing when Amber sidled up to her and rested her head on Pai's shoulder.

Despite the ache, Pai found herself smiling. Her brother's craziness was contagious.

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**PSAN:** I think I've been watching to many of these obscure animes. :sweatdrop: My writing style is starting to feel waaaaay to similar to a _Darker Than Black_ or _Gundam Wing_ episode. Is there anyone who likes this style?


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